The Mystic Arts of Erasing All Signs of Death (30 page)

—Web.

Harris shifted his weight forward and dropped the front legs of his tilted chair to the floor.

—Boy that girl's talkin' to you. Been tryin' to get your attention the last hour. You want to maybe give her a glance so she'll stop interruptin' me while I try to figure some crap out?

I glanced at Soledad.

—What?

She shrugged.

—I just wanted to say thanks.

—What for?

She looked at the ceiling.

—For coming to get me, what else?

—You're welcome.

I looked at Harris.

—OK, we're done.

He looked at Soledad.

—All done?

She folded her arms.

—Sure, fine, let him pout.

He tilted back and lifted the edge of the curtain and peeked out the window.

—Glad you got that bit out of your systems. Now you can maybe please shut the hell up.

He dropped the curtain and gave me a look.

—While I pass the time along till I get to a point that's coming soon where I figure this is all BS and I decide I have to do something to make amends for bein' made to feel foolish and all.

He tapped the cellphone he'd set on the table at his elbow.

—This don't ring soon.

He pointed at the room phone.

—I may have to replay certain incidents from our recent past, Web.

He laced his fingers behind his head.

—Know you know what I'm sayin'.

He was right, I knew.

I raised my hand.

—Can I go to the bathroom?

—Uh-huh. Just leave the door open.

I went into the john and unzipped and stood in front of the toilet and didn't pee because I didn't really have to go.

—I don't hear anythin' in there.

I stuck my head out the door.

—That's ’cause I'm pee shy around girls. Can I run the tap?

He waved a hand.

—Whatever it takes.

I ducked back in and turned the taps on full and stood at the can for a second and looked out the open door and turned and eased the shower curtain aside and stepped into the tub and tugged the bathroom window and it didn't open. I stepped out of the tub, hit the flush lever, got back in the tub and gave the window a good yank and it ground open on rusted tracks. The rush of toilet water was fading from the pipes and I got out of the tub and pulled the curtain closed and stuck my hands under the running water in the sink and turned off the taps and looked around and couldn't find a towel. I went out, my hands dripping.

—No towels.

Harris inclined his head at a couple athletic bags near the door.

—Got ’em packed away already.

I sat back on the bed, discovering that I suddenly had to pee very badly.

Harris pointed at Soledad.

—You need to go?

She shook her head.

He pointed at Jaime.

—You?

He furrowed his brow.

—Uh.

—Ain't something most people have to think about, jackass.

Jaime shook his head.

—No, no, I don't have to go.

—OK, well, from here on out, everyone's holding it.

Harris settled and put his hand back behind his head.

—Talbot. Know what you need to know ’bout that boy? Other than his teeth were gray from snorting crank and his hair was fallin' out and his skin was yellow and his nose was collapsin' in on itself? What else you need to know about Talbot was his car. Boy had this car, eighty-eight or eighty-nine Toyota or Honda or one of them other Jap cars all look the same. Had that car awhile. Know how long? Ten years. Had that car ten years. Know how he got it? Stole it. Boosted it off the street in Humbolt. Went there to score some grass and came back with some college kid's car. Used to brag on that car all the time.
Stole this car ten years ago and I'm still drivin'it. You believe that shit? Ten years in the same hot car and I ain't been busted. Bet I drive this car twenty years before they bust me for it. Cops so fuckin' stupid, had me pulled over twice since I stole it and they ain't busted me for the hot car I'm in.

He shook his head.

—Said that. Said,
Bet I drive this car twenty years before they bust me for it.
Never occurred to him to maybe unload the damn thing
before
they arrested him. He just figured you steal a car, you drive it till you get caught. Whoever drives his longest wins. 'Course, six of those ten years he bragged about he was inside for dealin'. That was before his habit got so bad he couldn't be trusted by no one to deal. Anyhow, that's about all you need to know about Talbot. Boy was an albatross the whole season.

—Web.

—Some farmer's leavin' a stack of irrigation pipe at the same southwest corner of a citrus orchard for a week, we hear about it from one of his wetbacks and send Talbot with a couple hands to pick it up. He comes back with a truckload of PVC. Ask him,
Where's the pipe
, he points at the plastic in the truck. That he don't even know the points of the compass to find the right corner is one thing.

—Web.

—But that he can't tell between PVC and steel is another.

—Web.

The legs of his chair came down.

—Boy, will you acknowledge the girl, for peace sake?

I rubbed my shin where he'd kicked me.

—I don't want to talk to her.

She clapped her hands to her head.

—Why? What the hell did I do?

I pulled up my pant leg and looked at the big purple lump.

—She knows what she did.

—No, I don't, I really don't!

I looked at Harris.

—She so knows what she did.

She got up.

—What I did? What
I
did? What I did was
like
you! What I did was need someone to hold me.

She came across the room at me.

—What I did was fuck you and have you freak out in the morning and I walked outside when you told me to get away from you and got kidnapped by the Oakridge Boys!

Harris leaned forward in his seat.

—Settle down now.

—You fucked asshole?

We looked at Jaime, still wedged between the bed and the wall, but newly roused from the nap he'd been taking.

She stuck a finger in my face.

—Yes, I did. And it was nice. And I needed it. And I thought he was cool and safe. But he's acting like every asshole I've ever fucked, by turning into a dick now that he's gotten some.

Harris knocked on the table.

—Said
settle down.

Jaime flipped me off.

—Knew you were an asshole.

I raised my hands.

—Hey hey I tried to talk you out of it.

—Oh yeah, you tried so hard!

I got off the bed.

—I did! I did! I knew it was screwed up and I tried, but you were all over me.

—All over you! OK, sure, I was all over you. But I. Shit. I. Oh, Web.

—Settle down!

Harris grabbed her by the hair and swung her around and slapped her and shoved her face down onto the carpet. Jaime started to push up from between the bed and wall and Harris planted his heel in the back of Soledad's neck and Jaime dropped back to the floor.

I didn't move.

Not being used to violence happening around me until recently, I didn't have a chance to move. But that didn't make Harris any more reluctant about planting the barrel of his revolver under my chin.

The barrel of a gun, it's cold to the touch.

I felt a vibration down that cold steel barrel as he cocked the hammer and the cylinder rotated and a live round slid into alignment with my brain. He pushed up and brought my eyes to his.

—Do you know why you are alive?

Well, there are questions and there are questions, yes? Sometimes you get asked the same question you've been asking yourself for a year. So you have the answer right there at your fingertips.

As did I.

—Man, I do not. I really don't.

He chucked my chin with the barrel.

—You are alive to clean up the mess after I kill these two. Because you have screwed me over.

A radio switched on and Waylon Jennings started singing “Lonesome, On'ry and Mean.”

Harris let a few bars play

—Come with me.

He backed toward the table, the gun still under my chin, and I came
along with him, hoping he wouldn't trip. He reached back for his cellphone, felt for it, opened it and the song stopped playing.

—Hello?

Behind his sealed lips, Harris ran his tongue over his teeth.

—And?

He listened for a bit, nodded a little.

—See you then.

He took the phone away, snapped it shut.

—Hn.

The cold barrel came away from my skin.

—Back up.

I did.

He pointed at the bed.

I sat.

He nodded.

—Well, can was there, ready to roll. And he is rollin'. Which, I have to say that is an interesting turn of events.

He started to bring the gun back up.

—Not that it really changes much for you all.

The door swung open and Mr. Big Ten Four crashed through and stumbled into the wall next to the bathroom door and left a bloodstain when his battered face slapped against it. Harris twisted, the barrel of the gun rotating away from us and toward his partner.

—What the hell?

Mr. Big Ten Four slid down the wall, streaking blood, one arm out, pointing toward the door. Harris continued to swivel, bringing the gun around, looking for the threat.

But by the time he got there and faced the door, Po Sin was inside it, the pistol that had looked so big in Gabe's hand the night before looking like a toy in his own.

—Motherfucker.

Harris didn't move.

Po Sin took another step inside.

—Motherfucker, don't point that gun at me.

Harris didn't move.

Po Sin put out a hand and shoved the door closed.

—Motherfucker, I am a tempting target, but do not point that gun at me.

Harris didn't move.

And then Harris took Po Sin's advice and did not point the gun at him. Instead, he twisted ’round and pointed it at Soledad on the floor.

—Anyone does any damn thing and I'm gonna do the obvious.

Po Sin's lower lip swallowed his upper.

—Motherfucker.

Here's the thing about witnessing something truly awful.

It sucks.

Here's the thing about witnessing a small child being shot in the side of her face and having most of the rest of her face smeared on your clothes and covering her body with yours because some part of your brain has registered the fact that she has been hit by a bullet and you suddenly find out that you are more than willing to have the next bullet hit and kill you if it means that she'll not be harmed any further.

The thing about that is that it hurts when the next bullet doesn't come.

You end up thinking about it a lot. When you're not thinking about that second bullet, the one you knew might come, and therefore could do something about, you are actually, in point of fact, still thinking about it. You don't really think about anything else.

Some of your brain, in order to keep you focused on things it needs you to do, like breathing and eating and such, builds little façades to place over the surface of the world. Perfectly detailed overlays that mimic the world you lived in before you had little girl face on your clothes. Illusions as painstakingly crafted as the relic Old West street fronts on studio back lots. Scrims of normalcy that keep you walking and talking and breathing and eating.

And because that's what you perceive, the hyper reality you inhabit, it's the behavior of everyone around you that seems out of sync.

I'm OK, man. What the hell is everyone else's problem? Why is everyone acting so weird?

But some other part of your brain knows it's a fake. And knows, as well, who is responsible for the fake. And knows that you can't keep existing in a fake world propped on wobbly jack-stands in front of the real.

Sooner or later a stiff wind will come and blow it down on top of you.

That
part of the brain sends out messages, bits of code meant to remind you of what's behind the sets. Scrawled missives.

Don't get comfortable. This all has to come down someday. Don't open that door, there's nothing behind it!

The gap between those two parts of the brain is dark and deep. Narrow, but wide enough by some inches to fall into and be lost.

But you're not thinking about any of that. The two worlds you're walking in are just background to one thing, one thought carved into endless variation.

Where is that second bullet?

And when is it going to hit me?

And make me useful again?

Always you're looking, whether you know it or not, for that opportunity, that chance to do it over again. A dream that will never come true. A shot at taking the bullet.

And saving the innocent girl.

Or a girl not so innocent.

I looked at the gun pointing at Soledad.

Heartbeat.

And I got off the bed.

Heartbeat.

And I laid my body over hers.

Heartbeat.

—Boy.

I looked up at Harris.

He centered the gun on my back.

—This thing is plenty big to go through the both of you.

—Web.

Soledad had twisted her face out of her armpit.

I tried to smile at her, but expect I grimaced.

—Hey.

—Web, did you just pee on me?

—Yeah.

—Thought you were pee shy in front of girls.

—I kind of got terrified out of it.

Harris snapped his fingers.

—You, Chinaman, put that weapon on the floor before I shoot these two with one bullet.

Po Sin put the weapon on the floor.

—And kick it on over.

Po Sin kicked it over.

—And sit your big ass down.

Po Sin sat his big ass down.

—OK. For the moment, we're all gonna stay pretty much like this till my boy over there comes to. Then we'll figure out how this all sorts.

He squatted and reached for the pistol near his feet and Gabe came out of the bathroom with the sap I'd seen in his glove box and smashed Harris' gun hand and the revolver dropped and hit the floor and Harris kept reaching for the pistol at his feet and Gabe kicked it clear and brought his knee up into Harris' face and Po Sin was up and moving and Gabe put the sap across Harris' knee and the cowboy went down and Gabe dropped and sat on his chest and took the sap and shoved it into Harris' mouth till it had to be at the back of his throat and Po Sin came over and looked down at me and Soledad.